1. Technical Field
The present invention relates to a vehicle body manufacturing apparatus that temporarily assembles a vehicle body by welding a workpiece to another workpiece in a temporarily secured body.
2. Related Art
Various techniques have been proposed and implemented for assembling a vehicle body by positioning and performing spot welding on a plurality of workpieces constituting the vehicle body.
Japanese Examined Patent Application Publication (JP-B) No. H06-59851, for instance, discloses a technique whereby two or more types of vehicle bodies in which shapes of clamp positions are unified among vehicle types are assembled using a vehicle body manufacturing apparatus that includes triaxial changeover units, as clamp apparatuses for positioning a body side and a roof, that are supported so as to be suspended from both sides of an upper frame, respectively, in a vehicle body assembly station and triaxial changeover units, as clamp apparatuses for positioning a body side and an underbody, that are disposed on both sides of a lower frame, respectively, in the vehicle assembly station.
In the vehicle body manufacturing apparatus as disclosed in JP-B No. H06-59851, however, clamp jigs for positioning a workpiece on a vehicle body are typically supported from the outside of the vehicle body by the triaxial changeover units, articulated robots, and the like disposed on the side of the vehicle body. As a result, when preliminary assembly and welding are performed, various mechanical sections for supporting the clamp jigs and the likes are disposed on the side of the vehicle body, which may impede movement of welding guns to welding locations.